I've tried this game on steam for a few days and I've really been enjoying it.

I have a few suggestions and some feedback for the developers if they read these forums.

Clan War System,

Some kind of a clan war system in which you can declare war with a clan, a few suggestions for functions;[list=]Declared war lasts N days and every kill during the war grants 1 point.The clan with most points are considered victors once the time run up, or the opposing clan forfeits.Some kind of clan buffs that you can purchase for points. (Small buffs like 10-50 HP for a few points, that affects your clan)No star removal upon killing newcomers in a clan war[/list]

Clan Interface Visuals

Right now it's hard to differntiate your friend from your foe in the heat of the battle.I'd say add some kind of "logo"-system next to every players name. I know Lineage 2 did this in a very good way, you could tell who the clan you were seeing was immediately. (They had a upload function for a 10x10px image or something like that)

You can see how it looked in Lineage 2 here (The blue icon next to her name "Tipka" is the clan logo);

More incentive to keep farming

Right now I'm a few days in, and I feel like I'm overwhelmed with materials, I don't even have a reason to go out and farm anything.I have very low XP % and maxed out skills for my level.

I understand the "No grind" but maybe you can add something for people to keep farming for?And that part that you farm needs to be worth fighting over.

More incentive to kill leaders (Weapon/Armor drops)

Give the leaders a chance to drop armors from +0 to +8, in order to keep everyone farming and fighting over it.

Settlements VERY confusing

So we were a bit late into the game and most of the settlements were claimed, we did however find one settlement that weren't claimed but it said "Can be claimed in 1108:40" or something like that, bug?

The other empty settlements we found all required a "Siege Weapon" or something like that.

We crafted a siege weapon and decided to just randomly attack a settlement, and after 1 hour we still had the flag under control, but once it was done we didn't even get the settlement? How does this work? I've found no information on it.

It's kind of BS that the early players can go and instantly claim settlements and we have to wait for days in order to get one?

More armor designs

Maybe a dye armor system where we can at least change the color?It's kind of boring when everyone looks the same.Maybe make every +level unique?

Those points above are what I find most important to fix atm.From the few days I've played, I've gotta say that you have something special here and you can make this game truly unique and special, keep on developing it and hopefully you will succeed! 5/5 considering that it is EA, GOOD JOB!

Clan War System,Some kind of a clan war system in which you can declare war with a clan,

We crafted a siege weapon and decided to just randomly attack a settlement, and after 1 hour we still had the flag under control, but once it was done we didn't even get the settlement? How does this work? I've found no information on it.

The "war" aspect is also occurring during control of resource points and defending caravans or events on the map.

Informally, clans at the moment tell their other members who they are allied and hostile with. The rewards for defeating hostile clans are that they will have a higher drop chance on the armour/weapon they have equipped, much like the rest of the game. Also it is a bit fun to be tribal and kill enemies.

Clan Interface VisualsRight now it's hard to differentiate your friend from your foe in the heat of the battle.

Agreed, this is quite an issue at the moment.

More incentive to keep farming

I understand the "No grind" but maybe you can add something for people to keep farming for?And that part that you farm needs to be worth fighting over.

Given that you can lose armour and weapons from dying, there will always be some incentive to farm a little after you lose things. The main thing you actually farm in this game is members for your clan . Also, you "farm" settlements through sieges, or resource control points with your clan, so you can get higher on the leaderboards.

More incentive to kill leaders (Weapon/Armor drops)

I don't quite agree with this one. The leaders do drop quite a lot already, and aren't very difficult to kill. Also, I think the design tries to avoid PvE being too dominant, and makes PvP (and Clan vs. Clan) the focus. Dropping weapons and armour would completely tip the balance towards farming these bosses for gear, and make other resource gathering efforts less important. The problem is that these bosses simply exist in the map, they aren't triggered, so they don't scale with the size of the group contesting them (unlike the other events). So you can't really tune their strength easily, a bigger group can always wipe them easier. So you can't make them too strong. In fact, it is probably better that there exists easy bosses so they are easier kills for smaller groups or solo players? And they mostly will get ignored by big groups, since they would prefer to do the bigger events?

More armor designs

I agree. I think they intend on Fame being used to purchase some cosmetics in the future though?

Thanks for that, I've been looking through forums and didn't find anything, but that page explained it.

Given that you can lose armour and weapons from dying, there will always be some incentive to farm a little after you lose things. The main thing you actually farm in this game is members for your clan . Also, you "farm" settlements through sieges, or resource control points with your clan, so you can get higher on the leaderboards.

I understand this to a small point, maybe this is true for solo players who barely play.But I have over 1000 of each material I need to craft, and I didn't farm anything yesterday because I had no reason to farm. The only thing we did yesterday was run around and look for PvP.

I logged in this morning at 8AM but I logged back out after 1 minute, because there is simply no reason for me to be online, I don't need any materials and I have maxed out all my skills and my XP % is very low.

How about they add some kind of reason to farm even when you are out of stuff to do?

Maybe even look at L2s system with enchanting gear, where you enchant gear with scrolls that you loot from monster, and every scroll has a 35% chance to upgrade your weapon further, and 65% chance to break your item. That would mean I could go in and farm scrolls and hope to get a little better weapon, and if I would break my weapon, that would mean more materials had to be gathered.

I don't quite agree with this one. The leaders do drop quite a lot already, and aren't very difficult to kill. Also, I think the design tries to avoid PvE being too dominant, and makes PvP (and Clan vs. Clan) the focus. Dropping weapons and armour would completely tip the balance towards farming these bosses for gear, and make other resource gathering efforts less important. The problem is that these bosses simply exist in the map, they aren't triggered, so they don't scale with the size of the group contesting them (unlike the other events). So you can't really tune their strength easily, a bigger group can always wipe them easier. So you can't make them too strong. In fact, it is probably better that there exists easy bosses so they are easier kills for smaller groups or solo players? And they mostly will get ignored by big groups, since they would prefer to do the bigger events?

Yeah sure, maybe those bosses are good for new solo players, but I haven't killed any bosses since day 1 of playing. They are gone to me, which seems like a waste of a feature :/.

Kekke wrote:I understand this to a small point, maybe this is true for solo players who barely play.But I have over 1000 of each material I need to craft, and I didn't farm anything yesterday because I had no reason to farm. The only thing we did yesterday was run around and look for PvP.

It ultimately depends on your goal. Soon as you want to have a settlement and build it up, that's the first drain on resources. The second part is when you are actively trying to 'win' the session, which means you want to keep the world alive, which means you'll have to donate. Server donations soon reach into the hundreds of thousands of points!

Kekke wrote:I understand this to a small point, maybe this is true for solo players who barely play.But I have over 1000 of each material I need to craft, and I didn't farm anything yesterday because I had no reason to farm. The only thing we did yesterday was run around and look for PvP.

It ultimately depends on your goal. Soon as you want to have a settlement and build it up, that's the first drain on resources. The second part is when you are actively trying to 'win' the session, which means you want to keep the world alive, which means you'll have to donate. Server donations soon reach into the hundreds of thousands of points!

I'm sure that players and clans with hoards of resources don't realize this at all. The respect factor isn't really advertised as the "high score" mechanism it is supposed to be. Perhaps it seems a bit forced, and there needs to be some clear sense that respect has any value at all. The fact that many servers are dying for not meeting donation goals already, means that players and clans don't really know that donations are what makes them appear on these high score boards, or if they don't care about high score boards, perhaps they prefer to craft the strongest gear and then see no further progression for themselves (which is the usual hamster wheel for MMOs that people probably assumes applies here too), and thus just quit? Perhaps donating and respect should have some value beyond just a "high score"?

Perhaps the leaderboards should have an effect in-game beyond just a list of numbers? Perhaps an in-game indicator who is winning on the leaderboards? Like the 1, 2 and 3 star system. which occurs currently for players, but for clans based on the existing leaderboard? Something in that direction. Very top players have some other vanity?

But for solo players like Kekke, perhaps they can craft something that appeals to them more than a clan would. Perhaps there exists sacrificial huts throughout the map which are neutral (much like the donation tent). There are some options there in exchange for a large amount of resources to the hut. Some ideas:

* Enchantment - A random enchantment, not just boring +damage ones, but something interesting and perhaps a mixed blessing. For example, a large aura around you that damages all players/monsters close to you continuously (you lose the buff after dying 3 times or 2 hours, whichever is first). Infinite possibilities.

* Set Clan Bounty - You can set a bounty on another clan (not player). Scoring multiple kills on that clan in the time limit causes a global debuff on that clan in some form for a period of time.

* Challenge to Duel - You challenge another player to a duel (they cannot be in your own clan). Both of you have an indicator showing the direction the other player is, if they are not currently on your screen (much like the "player group" indicator). Once one player sights the other (on your screen), you are both transported to a dueling pit (with various terrain, not just flat ground) after a short delay. First to die or disconnect loses. The area where you can duel reduces over time. so the duel doesn't last too long. Increased drop chance on armour/weapon for each dueler (cannot be 0%). Winner and loser announced to the server.

It's the typical 'problem' of mixing a persistent MMORPG-ish idea with a session based MOBA-ish idea.You can not offer 'in-game' boosts, because that would ruin the balance for the session based MOBA part, where you must have everybody start on equal terms. But players get bored of leaderboards fast and want a reward for their effort to motivate them.Fairytale Distillery went with granting people Fame which can later be traded for visual customization in-game (or potentially might grant access/customization of servers).I agree through, the communication of the benefits is a little lacking right now. Which server are you playing no and what time of the day? Maybe we should create a little explanation video of the Exiled basics?

Logain wrote:It's the typical 'problem' of mixing a persistent MMORPG-ish idea with a session based MOBA-ish idea.You can not offer 'in-game' boosts, because that would ruin the balance for the session based MOBA part, where you must have everybody start on equal terms. But players get bored of leaderboards fast and want a reward for their effort to motivate them.Fairytale Distillery went with granting people Fame which can later be traded for visual customization in-game (or potentially might grant access/customization of servers).I agree through, the communication of the benefits is a little lacking right now. Which server are you playing no and what time of the day? Maybe we should create a little explanation video of the Exiled basics?

Leaderboards alone are indeed boring, and create an artificial-ness to the experience if that is the only clear motivation. Fame giving visual customization is great, but there is a lot of potential in terms of gameplay customization/specialization too. With regards to 'in-game' boosts, I think something soft like another side-grade system (both an upgrade and a downgrade, like how we craft weapons and armour) for character customization works to preserve the essence of the game, which doesn't require grind but requires winning events or leaderboards, and thus creating conflict and motivation, because customization options are fun. These side-grades, importantly, can be lost and transferred on death, are generated rarely through actual contests, and only have a limited lifetime to preserve scarcity, which promotes conflict over a scarce resource.

I propose something like a Highlander/Rune system.

Runes are rare and generated through incentives in the game. They always have at least one positive effect and one negative effect (much like how we have to balance weapons and armour already). Perhaps an event is hidden on the map periodically, like a treasure hunt. Finding this location activates an event which can be contested, with the location advertised for a duration (much like the resource capture, but you or your clan are rewarded some runes). Happens perhaps every Saturday night (causes a focused event, like Battlecup on Saturday in Dota 2).

Runes have a high chance to be transferred to players directly and instantly (not looted) on a successful gank/kill (one random rune maximum transferred per gank/kill). The transfer-on-death rate increases with death until you lose a rune, then the chances reset lower. The rune is not automatically equipped, it goes to the rune inventory. It can be equipped at a dojo. Importantly, the transfer-on-death rate does not decrease with time like weapons and armour, so you can’t just stay offline for it to recover (which the weapon/armour system currently promotes, if you want to keep that gear).

The rune inventory has unlimited size and is a separate system. The number of runes stored on a character are displayed above the character, like a trophy/progression, like the present star system. Your equipped rune can be changed every hour at the dojo, to give customization options. It’s “bragging rights” beyond the star and respect system, on an individual level, with gameplay effects, but not unbalanced (much like how weapons and armours can be customized through balance). It’s also a “high value” target system, since there is more reward for killing them, with an indicator (a rune number) on them.

You can only have one rune equipped and active at a time, and it changes the title above the player name (e.g. Friendly Transporter). This allows players to quickly identify what rune others have active.

For “winning” on the leaderboards, the clan leader and 2 (or more) appointed generals (future feature?) of the respect winner (i.e. zerg clan winner) gets 1 random rune at the start of the next season. If the clan members believe that the leader and generals don’t deserve to win these guaranteed starting options, then players will choose to start their own clan since they would feel no justice in helping those they don’t like.

Elegance and efficiency winners get 1 random rune for every player in that clan. This makes it so you can be a part of a winning clan in respect purely through score (much like now), but it doesn’t reward these starting rune bonuses to those who work for them beyond a certain amount (only the leaders and generals).

But efficiency and elegance are rewarded by giving a benefit to having quality clans, and limits the runes at server start. It also creates conflict, since now having a big clan which works together with everyone isn’t automatically the complete “winner”, and there is the potential for conflict as things settle. These rewards should be made clearer (including the cosmetic and vanity options), so players have a clear purpose to “why” winning on the leaderboards means anything.

Runes expire after 1 month or so. This is so that the runes always have some form of rarity and are coveted, causing some conflict. Also, you need to be somewhat active to have a decent rune/highlander score.

So what are the runes like? They are mostly interesting side-grades that allow specialization of a character, so a form of (interesting) character customization. Examples:

Bard - You have a persistent bonus health regeneration aura to all clan members (yourself inclusive) near you, but your speed is reduced (causing you to become an important teammate, but vulnerable target in a fight).

Focuser - Your damage is increased, but your vision range is reduced

Destroyer - All characters and monsters around you take periodic damage (including players in your clan) [could be great for solo players]

Oracle - You can see players on your screen even if hidden by brush or fog of war. You cannot use invisibility spells.

Just some ideas. Other cool negatives and positive effects to be mixed and matched:

* You cannot be healed by other players* You explode (causing damage and leaving a fire patch) on death* You have access to a powerful new ability (takes a slot on your ability bar)